There is always a twinge of fear when you ask students to name their team for an activity. However, on one particular day, it led me to the great discovery of Undertale, a role-playing game (RPG) about a child who falls into a great hole and must find her way out among a world of fantastic (and hilarious) monsters. Although its retro pixelated art style and gameplay seem simple at first, Undertale lures players in as they learn the dark history of this underground world and get to know the quirky characters who aid, trick, and try to destroy them on their journey. Undertale may be laced with humor, but its message is far deeper than the underground world the player must escape.

Review: Imagine combining the mystery and intrigue of National Treasure with the puzzles and hidden messages in The da Vinci Code and infusing it into everyday classroom content and skills. With Breakout EDU, a game developed by two educators looking to bring the escape room craze to the classroom, teachers have the power to design an experience students won’t soon forget.

Review:First, if you have not yet read our reviews of Episode 1, “Chrysalis,”Episode 2, “Out of Time,” and Episode 3 “Chaos Theory,” and Episode 4 "Dark Room" please do so before reading the review for Episode 5, “Polarized.” This review will contain major spoilers and focus heavily on “Polarized” and the season finale, so you should try the other episodes first. For those of you unfamiliar with episodic games, think of them like chapters in a book. Each episode builds the story off of the episode before it to create one overall story. You wouldn’t read chapter five before you read chapter one! So follow the links above to catch up on Max’s story as she rewinds time to save her friends and her town.

Anyone who has followed this series of reviews has probably noticed by now that I am a massive fan of Dontnod’s episodic saga Life is Strange. Despite the sleepless nights that ensued, I developed a pattern of playing the next episode the instant it downloaded to my PC and staying up until dawn to write my review while the tumbling emotions caused by the episode were still fresh in my head. After playing the final episode, “Polarized,” however, I had a different problem inspiring my game-related insomnia.

Review: For those unfamiliar with the medium of games Stardew Valley can come as a surprise. It has no real ‘great evil’ to defeat, no major storyline to uncover, no impending threat. It is a just a simple game about making one rustic little community a better place.

Difficulty Rating: Easy​​Review: Benjamin Rivers describes his game Home as “a unique horror adventure.” Thinking back to horror games that set standards for the horror genre, it’s easy to smile at the jump scares of the original Resident Evil or the eerie sound of radio static in Silent Hill. But Home resembles neither of these horror franchises. It is, in fact, unique! While Home does pay respects to horror games like Resident Evil and Silent Hill, after several sessions with this beautifully pixelated world it is easy to identify why Rivers claims his creation is different from every other horror game.

Retro Review:While some may say that the golden age of horror films has passed, those decades certainly left us with images of Freddy Krueger, Michael Myers, and Jason Voorheese haunting our consciousness. And though reboots of many iconic horror movies have been showing up on the silver screen, video games have proven to be as much a horror experience for players as their on screen counterparts. Games like Alien Isolation are shining examples of how iconic film characters can transcend media and still carry the same weight as they did in other forms.​

Review:In the years since Journey’s original release, it has proven to be a game that resonates not only with “hardcore” gamers but also with players who look to interactive media as a bridge to cross into art, psychology, philosophy, literature, and even education. Reviewers and journalists in the video game industry write about Journey with a level of reflection that seems reserved only for fine art or a best selling novel: “Journey's beauty not only echoes in its vistas and music, but in the subtle details that coax you in” (Ryan Clements –IGN), “[Journey’s] deliberate ambiguity brings on the urge to speculate on deeper meanings, but meaning here is bound to be personal, and best discovered for yourself” (Jane Douglas –Gamespot), and “Give Journey the same attention you might bring to a musical concert, a well-directed film, or a long-awaited book, and its rewards are substantial” (Matt Miller –Gameinformer). So what is it, really, that makes this game so special? ​

Review:With an imaginative gameplay experience that douses a seemingly monochromatic world with paint and water, The Unfinished Swan is one of those unique games that much like a work of art continues to develop with each broad stroke of the brush. While the games itself is short lived, the story that unfolds is one that remains fixed in the player’s mind long after the game’s ending. And with a few collectables and level-up features, The Unfinished Swan keeps players involved in the painting fun.​

Review:Video games have primarily been a form of entertainment since they entered our culture. Following movies before them though, video games are becoming a medium for telling personal stories as well. In Minority Studios’ Papo & Yo, players follow Quico, a young boy whose best friend Monster plays with him and helps him solve puzzles. Unfortunately, Monster has a penchant for eating poison frogs, which send him into a rage and cause him to hurt anything and anyone in his path until he eats a rotten fruit. Quico sets out on a journey to cure Monster and save his best friend. On its own, the game would be an imaginative adventure game. What makes Papo & Yo stand out though is the story behind it: the story of the developer Vander Caballero’s childhood with his alcoholic father. Understanding the metaphor of Quico’s journey with Monster for Caballero’s experience with his father adds a new layer to Papo & Yo itself and to the potential video games have in our storytelling.

Review: To call Device 6 a puzzle game is to call War and Peace a pamphlet - neither label truly does the source material justice. Instead, Device 6 can best be imagined as a living, breathing text - complete with interactive parts, audio snippets, moving pieces, and a non-linear narrative that changes with each new revelation.